Tenants at South St. Paul’s Fleming Field are hoping to ground a plan that eliminates the airport’s manager.

And they’re willing to chip in the money to do so. The tenants are looking at ways to help fund the full-time position for 2011, giving the city time to come up with options other than to fire Glenn Burke, who has been the airport’s full-time manager since 1994.

City officials put Burke’s job on the chopping block last month in a cost-cutting move, saying it would save $42,000 next year.

“We want the city to slow down,” said Jeff Sheridan, president of the Fleming Field Aviation Association. “We believe they’re being penny wise and pound foolish.”

City officials are in the dark about Burke’s role at the airport, Sheridan said.

“The list of what he does is very long and falls into a number of categories,” he said.

Sheridan extended the tenants’ offer at a meeting with city officials this month. The city council considered the proposal at a work session last week and agreed to keep an open dialogue with tenants.

“I think it’s always a good thing to work with those folks,” city council member Tom Seaberg said afterward. “And, frankly, I think it’s being kind of stupid to turn down money.”

Sheridan said he would have no problem collecting the $42,000 from Fleming Field tenants, which include aviation-related businesses and 230 pilots who base their planes there.

“Even if I hit every airplane owner up for $100, that’s $23,000,” Sheridan said. “To them, that’s about 25 gallons worth of fuel.”

Bob Wiplinger, owner of Wipaire Inc., the largest tenant at the airport, said he would match whatever the other tenants contribute. He called the city’s plan to cut Burke’s job “asinine.”

Burke’s job is not the only one on the chopping block. The city’s only code-enforcement officer and two part-time jobs are slated to end at the end of the year. In addition, a parks and recreation position is being dropped to part time.

The city council signed off on the cost-cutting plan last month.

City Administrator Steve King contends the moves are not based upon performance. He said they’re needed to offset an anticipated $750,000 reduction in local-government aid and market-value homestead credit aid from the state.

“The big picture for us is that we don’t have any money,” he said.

Eliminating the airport manager position would save the city about $114,000 in salary and benefits, said Josh Feldman, finance director. The $42,000 figure was derived after factoring in the cost of having other city staff do Burke’s job, which includes everything from day-to-day maintenance to writing grants for airport improvements.

Since Burke was hired, Wipaire has gone from operating out of one hangar to a dozen, Wiplinger said. The business, the city’s second-largest employer, has 180 workers.

Wiplinger said he was planning to build another hangar at the airport but now is having second thoughts. The expansion would bring up to 40 new jobs to the airport, he said.

“I’ve explained all of this to the city and how getting rid of Glenn makes me really nervous,” he said.

Sheridan said that if the city’s plan moves forward, Fleming Field would be the only public airport in Minnesota without a full-time manager.

Traffic counts show an estimated 63,000 flights have taken off and landed this year at Fleming Field. The airport will generate about $375,000 through 119 leases, Burke said.

But the airport is operating out of a $1.6 million hole, which includes cost for capital improvements, King said. Since 2006, the city has spent about $515,000 to prepare airport land for tenants to build hangars. Of the 49 new lots, just three are being leased.

“We’re making no headway on the underlying debt,” King said. “We haven’t realized the boon we thought we were going to as far as building hangars and the like.”

The tenants’ offer “is not just a 12-month challenge,” Seaberg said.

“If you take the emotion and rhetoric out of it, engaging the people at the airport has already helped us long-term to provide financial stability for that airport,” he said. “Sometimes, even in the worst of times or situations, something good comes out of it.”

As you comment, please be respectful of other commenters and other viewpoints. Our goal with article comments is to provide a space for civil, informative and constructive conversations. We reserve the right to remove any comment we deem to be defamatory, rude, insulting to others, hateful, off-topic or reckless to the community. See our full terms of use here.

A marker on the Hillcrest Golf Course proclaims the Hillcrest Knoll to be Ramsey County's highest hilltop, though folks in Arden Hills and Shoreview might dispute it. Soon, the 1920s-era golf course may have another claim to fame -- housing, and lots of it. At Larpenteur Avenue and McKnight Road on the city's Greater East Side, Hillcrest represents 112 acres...

The owners of the St. Paul Saints are seeking an exemption from having to pay its players Minnesota's minimum wage. The Saints say without the exemption, the baseball team runs into a problem with a league rule limiting club payrolls. “We’re in a league that has a salary cap," Saints Executive Vice President and General Manager Derek Sharrer told state...

Construction of Interstate 94 through St. Paul in the 1950s and 1960s upended the Rondo neighborhood, forever separating what's now Summit-University with a deep highway trench. Maybe not forever. Organizers behind the ReConnectRondo initiative have kicked off a week's worth of community panels, a dinner, reception, tours and outreach opportunities with land use and real estate experts from the Urban...